Buster Keaton was a master at physical comedy but I felt sadness that he was still at the same antics so many years after have made his claim to fame. He could have progressed into another acting form or retired from the acting. I hope that I will continue to evolve in the art that I do so that I do not become static. There is no doubt he was a dynamic man until his later years when physical comedy is stressing even to young healthy guy, I just think he could have dedicated his time into cooking up something else than the proverbial gag or comical feat that he was known for all over the world.

There are others who don’t change their art form and ride on the coattails of an earlier success. Physical comedy takes precise timing something that Jerry Lewis used to incorporate in his movie “The Errand Boy.” The antics of him putting up a billboard poster when he would fall over himself was his mark, he was the clumsy  poster boy and also clumsy on the Hollywood set he got himself into. But after many years Jerry has had some guest appearances and largely taken up his time with fund raising. Recently I saw him chewing on a pencil as a guest on a talk show, and although I remember him doing something similar years ago, it was funnier then. I thought he could have done something more fitting with the times. I don’t think he got much of a laugh from the audience on that count. Maybe it was a question of timing or the gag was out of place.

So physical comedy is somehow ageless yet the actor’s physicality peaks in his younger years. Keaton did a comical sketch of a trip across Canada in his later years on in Canadian National emergency train car. He did not have to move around as much by being limited to a small space  so one could not see that he did not have he same energy he had when he was in his prime. Then he would be climbing engine cars and going from one car to the next while it was in motion in an escape scene. 

Today there are artists who emulate Keaton, Lewis and the others and are making short films for the web and short film festivals. I wish them well in their endeavor to keep this art form alive; the gag in itself will never age.